Production, protection and promotion of traditional food play greater and greater role in European Union states. At present, production of food with the use of traditional and regional technologies is perceived as a chance for small and medium-size food businesses. It makes communities of small towns and villages become active, contributing to the decrease of unemployment and giving regions a chance for development. The award of “regional indication” increases product competitiveness and can also become an important element of having an impact on a prospective client. Regional and traditional products are well-perceived and desired by consumers, which tempts some dishonest producers to forge their brand names and make use of them. Such activities mislead consumers as to the genuine origin of a product and thereby make traditional product manufacturers incur economic losses. In order to prevent such practices, the European Union has adopted a system of protection of regional and traditional products. A number of regulations have been issued in order to protect the foodstuffs. Also Poland maintains an inventory of food products of a definite origin or manufactured with traditional methods. Special laws and ordinances underlie their legal basis. Consumers are manifesting an increasing interest in that sort of food and they are usually a demanding type of consumers, ready to pay a higher price for such products but at the same time expecting to receive products of good quality and, first of all, safe, in return. Owing to customers’ interest, the number of business people willing to enter traditional food manufacturing is growing. But it is frequently the case that those who take up that type of food processing business are not prepared to that work. First of all, they lack elementary knowledge with respect to food product properties, their transformation during storage and, which is the most important, food-borne hazards. The lack of knowledge renders it impossible for them to maintain a reasonable approach to the establishment and running of food processing businesses so as to prevent the risk of food poisoning from taking place. At the same time, government competent food supervision authorities do not always play their role adequately. There are more than 732 products registered as traditional and regional in Poland among them 141 in meat category.
In the year 2007, within the framework of a project funded by AGROSMAK, the Polish Association of Food Technologists conducted a questionnaire survey among producers of traditional and regional food products. The survey had a nation-wide character and was conducted by a telephone interview method among 40 producers. About 67% of plants have implemented the HACCP system, 80% have developed a plant Good Manufacturing Practice code. Other aspects of food safety issues were also discussed in the article. It should be mentioned that raw materials used “yesterday and today” for production of traditional and regional food are incomparable; e.g. 40 – 50 years ago, pork was characterized by different properties as compared with today’s meat raw material. All breeding conditions have substantially changed. In this connection, production, and mainly requirements with regard to health safety assurance, should also change in comparison with production from the previous period since the raw material has changed. Technological and product parameters and their positive/negative impact for regional and traditional product quality were also discussed in the article.